What do you mean by RP threads? There have been plenty of RP threads made in Forum Games and Roleplaying that have run their course without being locked. If there were RP threads made in General Discussion that were locked, that only makes sense since they were made in the wrong section.
bay12 RPs = RPs about the forum, the community, and/or it's members.
Yes, and there have been at least three of those that I am aware of: after someone predicted the end of the world back in 2011 there was an apocalypse RP where we roleplayed ourselves responding to various apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic scenarios happening all at once. Now there were a lot people powergaming and making themselves wizards and spamming so much that normal people couldn't get a word in, but it didn't end in a lock.
Then there was Keeping up with Bay 12, which was about Bay12ers living in an apartment complex somewhere. I didn't ever participate because very soon it was overcome with the same stupidity that ruined the apocalypse RP, but it didn't end in a lock and it even got a reboot later on for some reason.
And before those I think Maximum Zero or someone else started up a where people played themselves on a desert island. It didn't get locked and it didn't devolve into a godmoding-fest because people were statted-out and therefore had something to tell them that they couldn't just be all powerful wizards and avoided the problems of the other two (though I think it didn't last long because some people stopped posting, which is what happens with forum games).
So I don't really know what you mean by bay 12 rp threads were all closed.
Dear god, don't remind me about Keeping up with Bay12. If I remember, I think I had some part in creating that in a random thread in general discussion. It was so terrible, and I was equally terrible in it. Every time I think back to it, I cringe.
But to agree, yeah. Freeform RP's just don't work out. You're giving people too much freedom, and when you give someone too much freedom they'll do something stupid. I haven't been in a single freeform RP that has ever, ever turned out decent.
Oh, yeah, definitely. I think one of the things that killed my space roleplay from awhile back was the fact that it was freeform and there wasn't really anything to define how big or powerful a ship should be (though the fact that I made people fill out basic character sheets and ask before including anything supernatural helped to keep things from going as crazy as most freeform games).
Of course, this means I don't know what to do when I do want to run a game again. I want to run a new (different setting) space game, but I can't go back to freeform, I can't find a system that will work, I don't know how to homebrew a system (I once asked advice on this, and people basically responded with, "what do you mean you don't know what to do? It comes naturally. Maybe you should just go do it; that should work." I understand that they may not know cognitively how they're doing it, butI'm not sure how that was supposed to be helpful in any way).
So, yeah, freeform does suck. I just wish I knew how to do something better.
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Topic: A Public Apology (Read 17568 times)